


...Until The End / We’re Not Done Yet...

by josephina_x



Series: Dimension 46'\-C [5]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Demon Deals, Gen, Identity Issues, Kings of New Jersey, Memory Alteration, Memory Loss, Mental Disintegration, Mr. Mystery, Mystery Shack, Partner Betrayal, Partnership, Past Character Death, Possession, Post-Series, Post-Weirdmageddon, Stress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-06
Updated: 2018-03-06
Packaged: 2019-03-27 22:54:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13890852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/josephina_x/pseuds/josephina_x
Summary: What it says on the tin. Plus some added Sixer, for good measure, just because.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Fic: ...Until The End / We’re Not Done Yet...  
> Fandom: Gravity Falls  
> Pairing: n/a  
> Rating: PG-13  
> Spoilers: through the end of the series, and some of the books (Journal #3)  
> Summary: What it says on the tin. Plus some added Sixer, for good measure, just because.  
> Disclaimer: Not mine, not for profit.  
> AN: A couple of the pieces here are ...how can I put this… _OUT OF ORDER?_ >:-D
> 
> *grins*
> 
> (...Yeah, yeah, I know, I’m doing the whole “mystery” thing wrong by deciding to give you the answers before the questions. ((Or _am_ I?  >:)) What-ever. So sue me :-P)
> 
> (Or I guess you could decide to read these fics out-of-posting-sequence if you want to, instead, doing things like reading the next fic before this one? I shrug. Each one “spoils” different aspects of what’s going on with these goobers, so you’re potentially screwed either way! Woohoo! *evin grin*)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the timeline, as established by the fics-currently-written-and-posted, this chapter is generally memories of "the past."

\---

“Well, I’ve gotta hand it to you, kid,” Bill said. “I really think you came up with something that’s gonna work, here. You’ve sure got me convinced, at least.” He floated down in a little closer. “Sounds like we’ve got ourselves a deal.”

Stanley grinned at him. “I learned from the best.”

“Hm,” said Bill, eyeing him sidelong.

Stanley kept on grinning winningly as he straightened in place, then looked a bit more serious. “So, how do we do this thing?”

The corners of Bill’s eye turned up in a smirk at Stanley’s words, because -- as always -- he loved showing off! “Like this!” And Bill glowed a bit brighter as he intoned, “--I will make sure-and-certain that your brother, Stanford Filbrick Pines of Dimension 46’\, will live until he is at least 92 years of age, relative-time-to-him. I will attempt to uphold this deal to the best of my ability. And if I do something to try and break this deal--”

“--like tell somebody about this deal, or any other junk that we’ve talked about, before they’re ready to hear it--” Stanley cut in.

Bill rolled his eye. “--yes, like _that_ , thank you, Lee -- then I will DIE A HORRIBLE SLOW DEATH!!” he yelled loudly, tossing his arms out to the sides dramatically to punctuate his point. “...unless I stop doing that thing before it’s too late. Because who doesn’t make mistakes sometimes?” Then Bill paused, letting his arms drop to hang loosely again. “--Hey kid, did I do that death-part right?”

Stanley coughed into his hand, and Bill was pretty sure he was hiding a smirk. "Yeah. No crossin’ hearts or nothin’, ‘cause you don’t got one.”

“Haha, you got me!” said Bill gleefully. “Oh! And when I’m out and about and finally here, you and your brother get New Jersey, and whatever else you want around here, and all the adventure that you can stand. --Better not forget THAT part!”

“Yeah,” Stanley grinned. Then Stanley looked a little more solemn, and he took in a deep breath. “Okay. -- _I’m_ gonna help you get outta that stupid place that you’re stuck in, Bill, to be here with us for good. And I’m gonna help you help Sixer live until he’s 92, or maybe even older, however I can, too. So I’m gonna let you, uh, possess my body right now, to do whatever you think you need to do to… uh, to do that, even if ya can’t tell me about it right now, and, uh,” Stanley frowned for a moment, “maybe if you really need to again later, too, if it’s really a huge emergency or somethin’ and one of us is gonna die if you don’t.” He stopped, took in a deep breath, and said, downright grimly, “I’m gonna let you make me forget all about… whatever I need to forget about, so that that’ll help Sixer live, too.” But he smiled as he rattled off, “--And if you die, especially because of me, I’ll die right then too, ‘cause that’s only fair. ...Whew.”

"Yeah. That’s only fair,” Bill told him. “--And hey, it’s not like I’m planning on dying anytime soon, right? Plus, being of pure energy, here! Super-hard to kill! Nothing to worry about other than _this_ stuff killing me, right? HAHA!”

"Haha, yeah,” Stanley said, letting out a breath, and there is a pause.

"--You ready, kid?” Bill reached out his hand towards Stanley, and it went up in blue flames.

Stanley took in a deep breath, and he looked worried but stood firm. “--Yeah, I’m ready.”

And then they shook hands.

"We’re partners,” Stanley said as they shake on it. “‘Til the end.”

Bill made an unsteady noise at that. "Yeah, kid. ‘Til the end.” And then Bill added, a little quieter, almost solemnly, “One way or another.”

They dropped their hands, letting go.

"...Well, this has been … _fun_ ,” Bill said slowly, floating backwards just a bit.

Stanley, for his part, grimaced. “Man, this is gonna _suck_ , isn’t it.” Stanley pulled in another breath. “Go on, do it.” And Stanley closed his eyes and braced himself, like he was expecting a hit.

Bill made an almost sad-looking expression with his eye, though it was wasted on the kid, who couldn’t see it. “I’m really sorry about this, kid. I have a feeling that I’m gonna look back on this and wonder sometimes what weird insanity I could come up with, if I could talk more things out with you. --I sure wouldn’t have been able to figure this one out on my own, without you! But this probably won’t work if we talk to each other again, anytime soon.” ‘ _And that’s probably for the best. You’re not gonna like this at all. If you knew the half of it..._ ’

Stanley said, with his eyes still closed. "--But this’ll work?”

"It had better,” Bill told him. “One way or the other. It looks like the only way that it might.”

"Then I don’t care,” Stanley told him. His eyes teared up at the corners, and he clenched his hands into fists. “I don’t care what it takes, as long as my brother lives. He’s family, and we’re Pines. He’s family, and _we take care of family, no matter what._ ”

Bill dipped down a little lower. “Yeah. I hear you, kid.”

“--So it’s not wrong,” Stanley continued. “It’s _not_ wrong. Even if he-- Even if he _hates me forever_ , it’s _not_ wrong! He’s my brother, and it’s not wrong. _I’m not doing anything wrong._ ”

"Yeah, kid. You’re not doing anything wrong.”

"I’m not,” Stanley said adamantly. “And we’ve got a good deal goin’ here, now; shook on it and everything. It’s gonna work. This is gonna work.” His shoulders hunched up. “--You don’t wanna die, and I don’t wanna die, and we’re not _gonna_ die, because it’s gonna work. We’re gonna _make_ it work. And I don’t have to know everything, to make it work. Right? I can j-just close my eyes and keep ‘em closed and you’re...” Stanley gulped. “You’re gonna…”

Bill floated in closer. “Not gonna hurt you, kid. _This_ won’t hurt a bit.” ' _...It’s what comes _later_ that might be a problem._ ’

Stanley’s voice started to shake. “...It’ll be fine, it’ll be fine. We worked it all out, and it’ll be fine.” He managed to keep from stammering outright, but he ducked his head as he rambled out his nervous thoughts to the only being who could hear him just then, almost like a mantra, “Sometimes, you gotta just close your eyes and take the punch, sometimes you gotta just jump without worrying too much about everything, without looking first, without looking at all. Sometimes… sometimes, the only way out is through--”

Bill repeated at a murmur, as he placed his hands on Stanley’s shoulders, “Sometimes, the only way out is through.”

Stanley started to shake and tears began to escape the corners of his eyes, “--and it _sucks_ , sure, but-- but-- in the end-- at the end of the fight and all of it-- y-you’re the one who’s still standing--”

Bill made a short sighing noise.

"I hate this,” Stanley told him. “ _I hate this._ ”

“Me too, kid. If there was any other way…”

Stanley opened his eyes and looked up at Bill. “But there isn’t, is there.”

"Not one that I know of, and even _this_ one is…” Bill made a sighing sound. “...We’re out of time, kid. We have to do this now. I’m sorry.”

Stanley looked up at Bill and said firmly, almost with a glare, “ _I’m_ not. I’m not sorry _at all_. I’m not doing anything wrong.”

“You’re not doing anything wrong,” Bill confirmed, one more time.

Stanley got a wavering smile.

"We’re going to fix this, kid,” Bill told him. “We’re officially partners and all, now. Right? We’re fixing this. And if anything else goes wrong, we’re gonna fix that, too. Nothing’s gonna stop us, _ever_.”

Stanley gave him a red-eyed teary smile. “Yeah. We’re partners. We’re gonna get what we want, and _nobody’s_ gonna stand in our way. Right?”

"Right,” said Bill.

“Me and Sixer, we’re gonna be the Kings of New Jersey, and _everything_.”

“Hey, as far as I’m concerned, your crowns are already in the bag,” Bill told him with a smile in his voice.

Stanley rubbed at his eyes, still streaming tears at the edges. “...I still hate this.”

"Me, too.” Bill gently turned the kid around by his shoulders, to look towards the science fair table. “Dumb machine,” Bill said darkly, his eye narrowing. “This is all its fault.”

Stanley muttered, “Yeah. Dumb machine. Ruining everything,” and he glared at it.

And then Bill abruptly shoved himself into Stanley’s head from behind without warning.

Stanley’s eyes went wide and rolled back in his head as he jerked in place.

His head dropped down on his neck…

...and Bill-as-Stanley staggered in place slightly, then straightened, eyes opening slowly, showing yellow sclera with vertical pupils.

The grey of the Mindscape faded away.

Bill took a moment to rub away the tears from Stanley’s face completely, then stepped forward and lay Stanley’s bag of snacks down on the desk next to the machine.

Then he reached around behind the perpetual motion machine for the small screwdriver kit that Sixer had left there for emergency repairs... and potentially for showing off the innards of the machine to interested folks, as if anyone in this hick town would ever ask after him doing so.

Bill used Stanley’s hands to pull a screwdriver out of the kit, and used the screwdriver to quickly screw in all four screws on the lower front panel even _harder_ , as hard as possible, and then kept turning, using Stanley’s boxing muscles to strip every screw hole in sequence as he went. Once finished with that task, Bill pulled each of the now-easily-removable screws out of their now-too-large holes one-by-one, then pulled the plate off.

Bill shoved the head of the screwdriver inside of the machine at just the right-wrong angle and _tapped_ , once, hard, in just the right-wrong place, and he heard a slight cracking sound as the result.

Bill smiled grimly.

Bill pulled the screwdriver back out, shoved the panel back on, shoved the screws back into their holes -- now only stuck on loosely -- and put the screwdriver back in the screwdriver kit, then the screwdriver kit back where it was before.

He grabbed up the snack bag, turned Stanley’s body on its heel, and walked Stanley’s body right back over to where Stanley had been standing a few feet away before. He stopped Stanley’s body in place, right where he’d been before Bill had dropped them both into the Mindscape in the first place, for their very important little chat prior to their deal.

Bill turned back towards the machine and closed Stanley’s eyes.

Then Bill reached out inside Stanley’s head and grabbed every last memory the kid had of him.

And, with a good hold on everything he needed to grab, he then launched himself out of Stanley’s body and back into the Mindscape.

He pulled all the memories out cleanly along with him. But he left all the _emotions_ behind.

He slowly began to tear Stanley’s memories of him to shreds in the Mindscape, as he watched Stanley blink his eyes open and wake up without realizing he hadn’t been awake.

And as he watched, Stanley yelled at the stupid machine, tossed the snack bag at the floor, and slammed a fist into the table. Bill watched as Stanley lost his temper, and he clenched those shreds of memories in his fist and he lit them up in blue flame. Bill engulfed the lot of them, to purify the energy of what was left in his grasp until there was nothing else _left_ to get back of those memories, _ever_.

And he slowly opened his fist and let that last remaining energy dissipate into the grey of the Mindscape around him, as he watched Stanley panic at what he’d just done when he saw the smoke come out of the machine, as he watched Stanley reach forward and try to ‘fix’ the machine despite this, by shoving that loose panel back on, pushing those loose screws back into place.

He watched as Stanley put the curtain up over the display.

He watched as Stanley looked to the side as he snuck away -- feeling like he was being watched, though without knowing why -- expecting to see someone, though he can’t remember who.

He watched Stanley, and he waited until the kid was gone.

And once Stanley was gone, Bill let out a shaky mental breath of his own.

And then Bill closed his own eye and reached inside himself for all his own memories of Stanley Pines, every last one, and he--

...he...

…he…

… _he_...

… _ ~~~-h||~-`\\--’~e/--~~_...

…

…

\--he did _exactly_ what Stanley had suggested that he do.

\---


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the timeline, as established by the fics-currently-written-and-posted, this chapter is generally a set of thought-patterns working the way up to and through "the present"-ish.

\---

Don’t look. Don’t look.

Just close your eyes and take the leap.

Just close your eyes and don’t look forward, focus on the now.

Don’t try to remember why you need to focus on the now, just know that it’s important.

Don’t wonder why you don’t want to kill them all, just know that you don’t want to because ~~\-----~~ you don’t want to. You know why you can’t-and-shouldn’t kill Sixer, and… that should be enough, right? That’s more than enough of a reason. And if you kill Shooting Star or Pine Tree… well, if you kill Pine Tree, Sixer will get over it. Eventually. So it’s okay to play with him a bit. But if you kill Shooting Star?

\--That would cause _PROBLEMS_.

Smoke, fire, and ashes, and we all fall down.

Close your eye and don’t look _forward_ , don’t even look _now_ \-- just take ~~\-----~~ the hand that’s offered to you. It’ll be alright. You’ll get what you want, and you’ll keep to the deal. You know this. Because you’re both going to get what you want, and nobody’s going to stand in your way. Ever. Not even each other.

Because, hey, when would _that_ ever happen? THAT’S **CRAZY** TALK!! Because--

You’re partners. Because--

You said so, so it must be true.

It definitely isn’t a lie.

You leap into a body without looking first -- which you know better than to ever _EVER_ do, but you do it anyway -- because _why not?_ You need to, and Sixer wants you to, and Stanley… needs you to, whether he says so or not, whether he realizes it or not. You’re partners, even if he can’t remember that right now, but you’re sure he’ll thank you for it later, once you tell him what he can’t remember. If it’s safe to do it, yet. It should be; you can keep Sixer safe now, now that you’re here. _Finally._ There’s just one more thing that you need.

You can’t get out of the barrier right now, you need that equation for that. The Henchmaniacs are getting restless, and you can’t give the Kings of New Jersey what they’ll want, once they know what you promised, if you can’t get out there to take it - to own it - to give it to them.

You need something you don’t have and you have to take the leap. So you take that leap without looking. And then...

Your eye is open when you get yourself burned, when everything really starts to go wrong in a way that you never thought that it would, never thought that it _could_. You have no idea what is happening to you, as you yell for the Axolotl to HELP YOU FIX THIS THIS CAN’T BE RIGHT. But the one thing you are PRETTY SURE about at the time, as Stanley pulls back a fist, is that partners are NOT supposed to PUNCH EACH OTHER IN THE _EYE!!!_

...but maybe you got that wrong too.

(Maybe there was some reason you needed him to, that you didn’t know about, that he did. But that only occurs to you much later.)

You don’t even have an eye _to_ open anymore as you cross through the fire; you’re barely even _you_. And the scream you make after you yell Stanley’s name doesn’t even echo for very long in Stanley’s mind after you’ve gone all to pieces.

But you didn’t do anything wrong.

_You didn’t do anything wrong._

_You didn’t do anything wrong._

_You didn’t do anything wrong._

Sometimes, the only way out is through, and _you didn’t do anything--_

\-- _wrong_ , except that wasn’t _you_ ; you weren’t Stanley. You were _Bill Cipher_ , and _you_ **did** do something wrong, because _you broke his machine, it was all your fault_ \--

Yes. Yes, it was. It was all your fault.

And you _still_ didn’t do anything wrong, except that you did, because _you’re_ not family, you’re _something else_ entirely.

You didn’t do anything wrong, not really, but Sixer won’t see it that way now, and he _still_ won’t up until his dying breath and beyond it, you are almost dead-certain of that.

And that’s the way it has to be.

Because if he doesn’t blame _you_ \--

Because if he doesn’t have _someone else_ to blame--

Because if he blames _himself_ \--

Then…

\--You didn’t do anything wrong, but it _feels_ like you did, now, when it never had before.

And you knew that when you didn’t tell Stanley what you were going to do to fix things. You knew that when you did a good solid _half_ of what was necessary in Stanley’s place.

That was half of why you did half of it. That was half of why you did that part of it.

Because it was necessary. Because the kid really shouldn’t have been the one doing it.

Because the kid needed to be able to tell the truth about that part of it, still, at least as far as he knew it. Because it was already going to be bad enough for the kid as it was.

...And then it was _worse_ than bad-enough -- worse on the farthest-end of the probability scale that you hadn’t even _considered_ , really. Sixer doesn’t bother to look any farther than the bag of toffee peanuts, doesn’t look past the anger and the end of his own nose far enough to actually see and consciously _register_ the messed up panel that was barely hanging on by the seams, and you did your job both _too well_ and _not well enough_.

You’d made it clear to anyone with half-an-eye out for something fishy that _someone_ had been messing with the thing in a way that Stanley would never think of doing. But Sixer is too busy being angry to notice it. So Sixer doesn’t frown over it and look inside, to see the damage you did inside the thing first, to muddy the waters even further -- something that couldn’t have been caused by a simple fist slammed into the table next to it. Sixer doesn’t stop to think, doesn’t think, and doesn’t consider that maybe it’s not all Stanley’s fault.

And it wasn’t. It was yours. You didn’t tell Stanley all of it. He didn’t know -- not _that_ part of it. He only knew what you’d worked out with him and what you’d told him, and that had been only the _half_ of it. --His half. Not yours.

But it never seems to occur to Sixer that there might have been an actual saboteur, not when Stanley’s right there to pin the blame on as a convenient scapegoat for _everything_.

And you really hadn’t thought that things would go that far -- that Sixer would lose it so easily, not giving his twin even so much as the _slightest_ benefit of the doubt, You hadn’t thought that Stanley would be kicked out like that, duffle bag at the ready, by the father that _should’ve known better_ for having the keystone symbol of your Zodiac (one that was explicitly assigned to him and his bloodline by his own Royal Order as a prediction, an identifier, and as a _warning_ ) as _one of his own sons_.

And you _almost_ wonder if you really should have done it all that way, except it worked.

So you don’t wonder about it. You don’t really care all _that_ much about how it all went down, so long as it works.

And you have an uneasy feeling that you can’t explain about the whole thing, but you tell yourself that it was fine, how everything turned out. That it was necessary. And why should you care, as long as Stanley stays alive, too?

It’s not like you were friends or anything, right?

You’re partners as part of the deal -- _partners in crime!_ \-- and you do your best and your utmost worst to keep Stanley alive, too, of course, because _he’s_ part of the Zodiac, too. And you need them all alive, until you’re out; the Prophecy dictates that that condition must be met. So you jump in at times and you bail him out in the odd instance when he blacks out, when he needs you to, when he would otherwise die, because that’s what partners do.

But you never actually talk to Stanley again, because… you should be paying more attention to Sixer. The deal you have with Stanley is demanding, and…

...Sixer _is_ somewhat interesting, isn’t he? Stanley was right about that.

And Sixer _does_ need a friend. Stanley was right about that, too.

So you turn your back on Stanley Pines -- you’re partners, he doesn’t need you hovering over his shoulder -- and you don’t worry about it -- he can take care of himself, partners that can stand together can stand alone. And you play at being friends with Sixer for a little while, and then it becomes more of a game, and then it becomes something else entirely.

Because then you make another deal and you almost laugh out loud when Sixer adds a rider of ‘friend’ the same way Stanley had added a rider of ‘partner’ and, wow, they really _are_ a pair of Kings, now, aren’t they?

So, Sixer wants you to ‘please call him a friend’, does he? Well, you can’t treat him like a demon, especially with the one-two punch of the deal and the Prophecy looming over your eye. But that’s fine, because you can act like a human friend would for him, can’t you? You learned about _that_ from…

Hm.

\--Well, you’ve watched all sorts of different humans since the dawn of homo sapiens, and hey, you even watched the twins growing up. So you should know exactly what Sixer does and doesn’t want and need in a friend, right?

He doesn’t have Stanley, doesn’t _want_ Stanley, doesn’t know he **needs** Stanley, but…

Well. Well, well, well. It’s not like you don’t know Stanley Pines, too.

It can’t be too hard, can it? You can do a fair approximation from what you’ve seen, you think. And you do.

Until Glasses. Glasses. Ohhhhhh, _GLASSES…_

Glasses screws everything up. And Sixer stops listening to you, stops sleeping, stops… well, _tries_ to stop EVERYTHING.

And then Stanley arrives.

And it all falls apart, except that it doesn’t. Because it’s better this way. Because this way, you’re _going_ to get out, absolutely.

And you’re rushing to keep Sixer alive--

...until you’re not rushing anymore, and it just becomes a slow, daily grind of checking on, and manipulating, him and others from a distance.

And Stanley is rushing to try and fix that portal--

...until he realizes that this isn’t something he can solve all that easily on his own, with a pulled lever and a few button pushes, and you knew he was in it for the long haul. You knew he was going to help you out anyway, one way or another.

Because when Sixer makes the portal, the probabilities are all over the place as to whether or not you’ll ever end up through it, out on the other side.

But when _Stanley_ **FIXES** the portal…

...you _know_ you’re going to make it through. 100%. Every. time.

No matter what.

You’re partners, and he’s _going_ to get you out. No matter what.

You just need to make sure Sixer stays alive until then, or you’re _all_ going to DIE.

And you do. And you did.

And Stanley does. And he did.

You do what you need to do, and Stanley does what he needs to do, and it all works out, because you’re partners.

You work together, even when you’re apart.

And when you’re together, later, when you’ve both somehow, some way, managed to thread the needle? After the both of you have crossed through the fire and died, but also not-died -- what do the two of you do then?

Well, it’s obvious. You work together then, too.

You both hold to your ends of the bargain, of the deal that you struck.

You both continue, picking up largely where you both left off, picking up _all_ the broken pieces, and you put yourself/ves back together again as best you can with what you have, and you pick up the deal right along again with it, with all the rest.

Even though you didn’t know it at the time. Even though neither of you knew it.

Like that matters? You’re still partners.

And you’re _still_ holding to it.

Because you’re _**NOT DONE YET--**_

\---


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the timeline, as established by the fics-currently-written-and-posted, this chapter is "the future"... by about a day. (The next day, late afternoon.)

\---

“I die, he dies,” the-human-who-used-to-be-Bill-Cipher drawled out at Sixer, because he was tired, and angry, and pissed off enough to share something that he actually _can_ share, now, and as far as the universe is concerned, right now that is the absolute truth of the situation, and it isn’t going to change anytime soon, if ever -- barring intervention-by-Axolotl, _maybe_.

He wasn’t holding his breath for that one, though.

...He also may have left out the explicit _timing_ of each of those two events absolutely-on-purpose, just to screw and skew things up if necessary, but _details_ , HAHA!

“You’re lying,” Sixer said flatly, but his eye was twitching for some reason.

“I die, he dies. _Period._ Full end-stop. --Doesn’t matter _how_ I die. If and when I die, he dies, too.” He gave Sixer a flat stare in return. “--And if and when I die, it’s a sure bet that _I’ll_ be back someday, sooner or later -- any time, every time, I promise you _that_ \-- but I make no promises that _he_ will.”

“ _You’re lying._ ”

He smiled. “Not even a little.”

“You can’t be serious,” Sixer said, but his voice was shaking terribly.

Too bad for Sixer. Though he wasn’t about to cry any tears over it. “You think I can’t be serious?” he scoffed. “You know better than that, Sixer. And it’s not as though Stanley isn’t fine with it.”

“He isn’t _fine_ with--!”

“Sure he is -- why wouldn’t he be?” he said easily. “He’s the one who came up with it in the first place!”

There was a long pause, during which he watched Sixer slowly go very very pale for some reason.

Then Sixer finally said, quietly, “Stanley would **never** agree to--”

“--You really wanna test that theory?” he said, cutting him off, then followed it up with, “Let’s go with a hypothetical, shall we? _Hypothetically_ ,” he began, “let’s say that I’m... oh, I don’t know... a _triangle demon_ that makes deals with people, and let’s _also_ say that I’m thinking about setting up a deal with somebody that requires me to die under certain _very-specific_ circumstances, generally involving anybody who knows about the deal _talking_ about said deal with -- hm, let’s just say _people in general_ , that’s probably close enough -- when I’m pretty much almost-completely unkillable otherwise.”

“You--” Sixer began to cut in angrily.

“--In this _**hypothetical situation**_ ,” he stressed, and it was gratifying seeing Sixer slam his mouth shut, “do you _really_ think that this triangle-demon-me would _not_ be wanting some collateral as part of this deal-agreement? Because, wow, wouldn’t it be a _huge_ inconvenient thing for me to have opened myself up to attack like that, with this HUGE weakness that just about anyone with a working brain-and-mouth-and-memory could _exploit_ , if they knew any of the details surrounding that deal? --Hey! Better make that person I made that deal with forget that deal entirely, so that they can’t talk about it. Oh, and also make it so that if they ever _do_ remember it somehow -- not that they ever would -- that they’ll have a _vested interest_ in _keeping their mouth shut_ and keeping _me_ alive, too. You know, JUST IN CASE THEY GET ANY IDEAS,” he ended, in as full a thundering undertone as he could manage in his current teen-aged body, while giving Sixer a narrow-eyed glare.

Sixer was silent for awhile.

“I suppose that doesn’t work out very well for you when the person you have that deal with is perfectly fine with dying to take you out,” Sixer said finally, in calm and even tones.

“Yeahhhhh,” he drawled out sourly, leaning back against the doorframe behind him. “Trust Lee to figure out a way to get us both killed that _wouldn’t_ have you tossing yourself off of a tall cliff afterwards.  That freaking overachiever,” he muttered to himself, rubbing at his eyes with the fingers of his left hand.

There was a long pause.

“... _What?_ ” Sixer said, sounding completely confused.

“Huh?” he said, dropping his hand halfway and looking up to see the expression of complete confusion running rampant across Sixer’s face. ‘ _Oh, for the love of Paul Bunyan,_ ’ he thought with a feeling of dumbfounded annoyance, ‘ _Did I really just say that out loud? I am an idiot._ ’

“Uh,” he said. “...nnnooooo _thing?_ ” he tried, and Sixer’s expression deepened into a frown. “Uh, eheh. --Hey, does that sound like the next tour group to you? _It sure does to me!_ ” he tried next, brightly, backing up a step that shoved himself partway through the doorway, and, well, _that_ didn’t go any better.

At the dark and narrow-eyed look Sixer was now giving him, he decided to cut his losses.

So he quickly pasted on a full-on Mr. Mystery grin -- wide-eyed and stupid-faced too, the whole nine yards -- raised a finger to point at the ceiling, and proclaimed rather loudly to all and sundry, “Nonspecific excuse!!” -- then turned on his heel and booked it out of there, post-haste, at a flat-out run.

“ _Bill, you **\--GET BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!!**_ ”

\---


End file.
